Record industry victory silences bargain net CDs

Music fans will no longer be able to buy cheap CDs from Internet stores which bring in supplies from outside Europe following a landmark legal case.

The move could add up to £3 to the price of top - selling chart CDs bought over the web, and will also affect the availability of cheap DVDs.

The British Phonographic Industry won a High Court ruling against the web store CD Wow.

The company faces an immediate legal bill of £150,000, and this could spiral to several million pounds with damages.

The savings available from CD Wow and similar web stores are substantial. For example CD Wow, which sells 23 per cent of all CDs bought by UK consumers on the Internet, is offering the new Joss Stone album for £7.99 including delivery.

This compares with £8.99 from other Internet sites, £9.77 from supermarkets and a recommended retail price of £15.79.

The court ruling which puts such savings in jeopardy has been condemned by CD Wow, consumers and even some artists and record industry insiders.

CD Wow has been selling genuine merchandise, legally supplied by record companies to retailers in the Far East.

The BPI relied on copyright laws that allow manufacturers to ensure that consumers in Britain and Europe can only purchase products officially supplied within the region.

It said the law is necessary to protect British retailers and ensure they are not undercut by overseas rivals.

However, CD Wow founder, Henrik Wesslen, said: "At a time when the record industry is losing vast revenue to piracy, it seems ludicrous that they set out to destroy a section of the market that is actually making them money.

"It strikes us that this litigation smacks of a personal vendetta rather than a legitimate commercial exercise."

Even the former director of anti-piracy at the BPI, David Martin, backed CD Wow.

"Morally I don't think they are doing anything wrong," he said.

The BPI and CD Wow have been at loggerheads since 2002.

In 2004, CD Wow signed court undertakings not to bring in cheap CDs from outside Europe. The High Court case revolved around the company's failure to abide by these undertakings.

The BPI made clear it would use the ruling to stop other firms using the same cut-price tactics.

The organisation's general counsel, Roz Groome, said: "This judgment confirms that CD Wow have not only consistently flouted the law in their business practices, but have flagrantly ignored the undertakings that they themselves gave to the court that they would trade legally."